The Sudanese government together with the Janjaweed militia have launched new attacks in northern Darfur, the African Union (AU) has said. The AU said the ground and air offensive was a flagrant violation of security agreements. It said there had been a heavy toll on a civilian population. Rebels in the area said 70 people had died. Earlier, Sudan welcomed the UN's support for AU peacekeepers in Darfur but denied the UN will take command. The AU said in a statement that Birmaza, a much fought over village in Darfur, had been subject to ground and aerial assault. The statement said there had been heavy casualties among the civilian population, but gave no figures. Rebels in the area said the government troops and Arab militia were continuing on Saturday to burn villages and loot cattle. So far there has been no official reaction from the government in Khartoum.... http://news.bbc.co.uk

The 21-year-old Russian sat before a clerk of the U.S. Army Judge Advocate's office, describing the furnaces at Auschwitz, the Nazi death camp where he had been a prisoner until a few weeks previously. "I saw with my own eyes how thousands of Jews were gassed daily and thrown by the hundreds into pits where Jews were burning," he said. "I saw how little children were killed with sticks and thrown into the fire," he continued. Blood flowed in gutters, and "Jews were thrown in and died there"; more were taken off trucks and cast alive into the flames. Today the Holocaust is known in dense and painful detail. Yet the young Russian's words leap off the faded, onionskin page with a rawness that transports the reader back to April 1945, when World War II was still raging and the world still knew little about gas chambers, genocide and the Final Solution. ...http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=2664227

US President George W Bush is trying to persuade Asia-Pacific leaders at a Vietnam summit to give full support to UN sanctions against North Korea. Mr Bush met South Korean and Japanese leaders, and on Sunday will meet those of China and Russia, both of whom are reluctant to back a tough line. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice urged North Korea to follow Vietnam's example by putting the war behind it. At the summit itself, leaders committed to restarting global trade talks. In a joint statement, heads of state and government of the 24 Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation (Apec) member states said they were ready to move beyond their current positions to break the deadlock. They said they had committed themselves to cuts in agricultural subsidies, the main issue which stalled the so-called Doha round of World Trade Organization (WTO) talks in July. ...http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6160884.stm

Iran, facing possible U.N. sanctions for failing to halt sensitive nuclear work, will press on with its Arak heavy water reactor with or without help from the U.N. nuclear watchdog, a top Iranian nuclear official said.The International Atomic Energy Agency has repeatedly urged Iran to reconsider the Arak project, but Iran has kept on building and now wants IAEA technical expertise to ensure the plant meets safety standards. Diplomats say the IAEA is unlikely to agree because of fears the Arak plant, which Iranian officials say is for peaceful purposes, could produce atomic explosives. "Whether the IAEA helps or not, the research reactor in Arak will continue its work," the Iranian Student News Agency (ISNA) on Saturday quoted Gholamreza Aghazadeh, the head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organisation, as saying. ...http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=2664223

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice appealed to Iraqis on Saturday not to let the sectarianism that is fuelling an orgy of violence destroy their country.A recent surge of kidnappings by men in uniform has stoked fears of infiltration of Iraq's security forces by members of both sectarian militias and criminal groups. Continuing arguments on Saturday between Sunni- and Shi'ite-run ministries about the fate of hostages seized from the Higher Education Ministry on Tuesday underlined the extent to which sectarianism infects politics at the top. Rice said during a visit to Vietnam that Iraqis "have one future and that is a future together. They don't have a future if they try to stay apart." ...http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=2664239

The Hamas-led Palestinian government said on Saturday that the United States, rather than Hamas, must change its policies if it hopes for peace.Washington is preparing for a possible peace push that could include an international peace conference in Jordan at the end of the month. But a U.S. official and diplomats said any such meeting hinged on a planned Palestinian unity government meeting the conditions of the Quartet of Middle East mediators: to recognize Israel, renounce violence and abide by past agreements. Hamas is sworn to Israel's destruction and has said that any unity government it joins will not recognize Israel's right to exist. ...http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=2664240